Mistake
by tommyhanson
Summary: When Nate’s really drunk Eliot tries to take his keys. When that doesn’t work he gets in the car with him. The second "chapter" has a re-written version with an alternate ending, if the first didn't suit your tastes.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: Okay, so. Don't hate me. Please. But my last story had a fluffy ending and I made __the horrible mistake of listening to Tim McGraw's new song "Ain't Nothin' To Die For" __and watching Rascal __Flatt's new video "Here Comes Goodbye" the same day that I __watched several episodes of Leverage (when I was extremely sleep deprived) and the __plotbunnies attacked without mercy. …You can hate the plot bunnies if you want. _

**Mistake**

"Nate! Nate! Hold up!" Eliot rushed out after him, catching up just as the older man began fumbling for his keys, trying repeatedly to get the correct one into the door lock. "Nate, you're drunk."

"Well, yes, Eliot, that was in fact the purpose of my drinking," Nate informed him calmly, the slight slur in his words the only difference between this voice and the one he used when directing him on a job.

"You're too drunk to drive."

"I am not."

"_Yes_, ya are. Gimme the keys, I'll take ya home."

"I'm fine," Nate told him shortly. "And I don't feel like company." He finally stopped messing with the keys and grabbed the small electronic lock remote instead, pressing it, and the car unlocked with a small 'bleep!' He grinned in Eliot's direction, his eyes not quite focusing on the man himself. "Got a button. Forgot."

Nate half-stumbled into the vehicle, slouching in the seat, and turning his attention to the suddenly impossible task of _starting_ the car.

"Damn it Nate, gimme the keys!" Eliot cried frustratedly.

Nate's response was to slam his door closed and press down on it's lock.

Eliot growled and reached for the passenger side door, and threw himself into the seat, slamming his own door with twice the force Nate had, just to spite him.

The engine finally roared to life, and Nate turned slowly to look at Eliot, a slight wrinkle between his brows, like the one that appeared there when Sophie was talking about her ridiculous number of shoes, or when Hardison rambled on about the latest season of _Doctor Who._ "Hey. What're you doin' here? I locked the door."

"You locked _your_ door."

"…Oh. Go 'way."

"_No._ You're too damn drunk to drive, Nate. Hell, you're almost too drunk to _walk._"

Nate ignored him and gunned the engine, pulling out onto the road.

"Damn it, Ford!" Eliot cried out, scrambling to find something to grasp on to as the car skidded every which way, tossing him about. "Slow down!"

Nate continued to ignore him, and wove in and out of traffic at breakneck speeds, like an erratic NASCAR driver on crack. Above the roar of the engine Eliot could hear horns blaring and angry drivers shouting curses as they flew past. Trees, buildings, headlights and cars blurred by in a dizzying array of color, light and shadow.

"Nate, you're gonna get us killed!"

Nate still didn't reply, but Eliot saw something dark flicker behind his eyes.

"Is that it Nate? Huh? 's that it? You got a death wish?"

"Shut up, Eliot."

"What do you think dyin's gonna do, huh Nate? You think it's gonna fix anything? Your body lyin' in the ground next to your kid's, that gonna make things better?"

"Shut up!"

Eliot ignored him. "'Course it probably won't just be your boody, Nate. Not like this. You'll end up draggin' somebody down with you. Kill an innocent bystander. A stranger on his way home to see _his_ wife and kid. A _friend_, trying to keep you from doing something _stupid-_"

Nate turned to glare at him, his eyes seething with anger, and his voice sharp and acidic as he reminded him "We're not friends."

Maybe if Nate hadn't turned he would have seen the red light. As it was, all he saw was the demonic glow of headlights and the hurt in Eliot's eyes before his world exploded and everything turned black.

Nathan woke to the sound of sirens in the distance. Everything hurt. Even his eyelids felt bruised, probably from the lead weights he was sure were attached to them, as he struggled to pull them open.

When he finally did manage to open his eyes and look around, his first absurd thought was _Who turned the world upside down?_ before he realized that he was actually suspended in his overturned car by his seatbelt.

He struggled with the restraint until it released him, and he fell to the roof of his car, and crawled out through the window, taking stock of his injuries as he did so. Everything hurt, but it didn't _seem_ like anything was broken. There was a slow trickle of blood coming from his forehead, as well as a few minor cuts on his left arm, and what he was sure was going to be and angry bruise across his chest and abdomen from his seatbelt, but overall he supposed he was lucky. At least, if the heap of metal that was once his car was any indication.

Okay, so. Alive? Check. Functional? Check. Help on the way? Check. So what was he missing?

The answer forced all the breath from his lungs as a surge of panic gripped him.

Eliot.

He glanced back into the remains of the car, but didn't see the younger man. Carefully, he took a few shaky steps away from the wreckage, his eyes scanning his surroundings.

There. He saw him.

As quickly as he could, Nate rushed to his side, dropping to his knees with a wince, and hesitantly reached out to gently touch the side of Eliot's face.

_Oh God._

He was covered in blood. Soaked in it. On his face, his arms, matted in his hair, seeping through his clothes, dark, sticky stains, expanding ominously. Nate felt like he should be doing something, _anything_ to help the younger man. But he was afraid to touch him with anymore than the light press of his fingers, for fear of hurting him further, and his mind was stuck on an endless loop of _ohGodohGodEliotnoohGodohGodplease…_

It took a moment for Nate to realize that somebody had a hold on him, and was pulling him away, as two other people began buzzing around Eliot, touching him and saying things he couldn't understand, and then _moving_ him, and as they were loading him in the back of the ambulance, Nate pleaded "Don't hurt him."

Somebody ushered him into the back of the van as well, and he went willingly, his eyes never leaving the sight of Eliot's prone and broken body. One of the medics began dabbing at his head with a bit of Gauze, but Nate waved him away like a pesky fly, his focus solely on Eliot.

He had no idea how long it took to get to the hospital, though it felt like days, but all too soon Eliot was being whisked away by urgent-sounding doctors, behind swinging white doors, and he quickly moved around to the window, peering through the glass as Eliot was transferred to a bed and hooked up to too many tubes and wires.

He had been here before.

Feeling this chilling, choking sensation, a panicked pressure in his chest, and a curling sickness in his belly. Wanting to stay in this terrible, horrifying moment, for the fear of what awaited him once it passed.

Nate had been here before.

With Sam.

And now here he stood once more, staring into a hospital room, and feeling utterly _useless_ as doctors tried to shock a member of his family back into life. Feeling like a complete _failure_ each time his body convulsed, arching off the table, heart monitor screaming shrilly, competing with Nate's own hoarse cries.

Over two years, and it was as if nothing had changed.

Except this time he only had himself to blame.

Nate stood at the very back of the small gathering, removed from everyone else.

He couldn't see them. Not again.

He couldn't stand to see the crushing disappointment in Sophie's eyes, the burning accusation in Hardison's, or the shattered, lost look in Parker's.

Not again.

His vision began to blur as the sleek, dark casket was lowered into the ground, but not so much that he couldn't see Parker throw herself into Hardison's arms, clutching fistfuls of his suit while he held her tightly, or Sophie's bowed head and the heaving of her shoulders.

He turned away, and forced his feet to move, fleeing the sounds of hoarse sobbing, and dirt hitting mahogany wood.

He's not quite sure how he mad it back to his hotel room. But when he did, he locked and chained the door, reflexively reaching for the bottle filled with amber liquid.

He had it halfway to his lips before he even realized what he was doing. Then he threw it across the room, watching it explode against the wall, and paint it in pale brown, dripping down the plaster.

He felt haunted. Sights and sounds floating around the room, echoing back from the days past.

"_Nate, you're gonna get us killed!"_

He took a step.

"_We're not friends." _Twice he'd told him that, and twice, just briefly, he'd seen raw hurt pass across his face.

He took a few more steps, reaching the wall safe.

He began turning the lock as once more he saw Sophie's concerned gaze, taking in his bruises and bloodied hands. _"Where's Eliot?"_

His hollow reply. _"He's gone."_

The fear lacing Hardison's voice when he asked _"What do you mean, gone?"_

His hands were shaking as he opened the small door and took out his prize.

"_You'll end up draggin' somebody down with you."_

He began to walk towards the small bathroom, his steps heavy but sure.

The memories kept coming.

Parker's tiny fists beating against his chest, her face wet with tears. _"You killed him! You killed him!"_

He stopped in front of the mirror, and raised his head to see his reflection.

His eyes were rimmed in red, his face scruffy from days without shaving, and his dark suit was wrinkled, hanging limply from his frame. He could see Eliot's ephemeral form behind him, leaning casually in the doorway, wearing the clothes he'd worn the last time Nate had seen him, only clean of all his blood.

"_You got a death wish, Nate?"_

He dragged his eyes away from the sight.

"_What do you think dyin's gonna do, huh Nate? You think it's gonna fix anything?"_

Nate raised his arm, enjoying the cold, heavy feel of the object in his hand.

"No," he answered quietly. "I don't know how to fix this." He forced his eyes to meet those of the phantom's who stood behind him. "But I can make sure I don't hurt anyone else."

He put the end of the gun in his mouth.

He'd been here before.

Once before.

Except this time he pulled the trigger.


	2. With Alternate Ending

_A/N: Okay, so I had several people beg/bribe/bully me into writing an alternate ending. Personally, I don't like it quite as well as the first one, but hey, this one has the bonus of not having an excessive number of dead characters, so I suppose that's of the good. Oh, and please keep in mind that I just spent most of the day working on this even though I should probably have been working on my actual college assignments before my profs get all annoyed… Again… So, please, leave a review. Thanks! =)_

**Mistake**

"Nate! Nate! Hold up!" Eliot rushed out after him, catching up just as the older man began fumbling for his keys, trying repeatedly to get the correct one into the door lock. "Nate, you're drunk."

"Well, yes, Eliot, that was in fact the purpose of my drinking," Nate informed him calmly, the slight slur in his words the only difference between this voice and the one he used when directing him on a job.

"You're too drunk to drive."

"I am not."

"_Yes_, ya are. Gimme the keys, I'll take ya home."

"I'm fine," Nate told him shortly. "And I don't feel like company." He finally stopped messing with the keys and grabbed the small electronic lock remote instead, pressing it, and the car unlocked with a small 'bleep!' He grinned in Eliot's direction, his eyes not quite focusing on the man himself. "Got a button. Forgot."

Nate half-stumbled into the vehicle, slouching in the seat, and turning his attention to the suddenly impossible task of _starting_ the car.

"Damn it Nate, gimme the keys!" Eliot cried frustratedly.

Nate's response was to slam his door closed and press down on it's lock.

Eliot growled and reached for the passenger side door, and threw himself into the seat, slamming his own door with twice the force Nate had, just to spite him.

The engine finally roared to life, and Nate turned slowly to look at Eliot, a slight wrinkle between his brows, like the one that appeared there when Sophie was talking about her ridiculous number of shoes, or when Hardison rambled on about the latest season of _Doctor Who._ "Hey. What're you doin' here? I locked the door."

"You locked _your_ door."

"…Oh. Go 'way."

"_No._ You're too damn drunk to drive, Nate. Hell, you're almost too drunk to _walk._"

Nate ignored him and gunned the engine, pulling out onto the road.

"Damn it, Ford!" Eliot cried out, scrambling to find something to grasp on to as the car skidded every which way, tossing him about. "Slow down!"

Nate continued to ignore him, and wove in and out of traffic at breakneck speeds, like an erratic NASCAR driver on crack. Above the roar of the engine Eliot could hear horns blaring and angry drivers shouting curses as they flew past. Trees, buildings, headlights and cars blurred by in a dizzying array of color, light and shadow.

"Nate, you're gonna get us killed!"

Nate still didn't reply, but Eliot saw something dark flicker behind his eyes.

"Is that it Nate? Huh? 's that it? You got a death wish?"

"Shut up, Eliot."

"What do you think dyin's gonna do, huh Nate? You think it's gonna fix anything? Your body lyin' in the ground next to your kid's, that gonna make things better?"

"Shut up!"

Eliot ignored him. "'Course it probably won't just be your boody, Nate. Not like this. You'll end up draggin' somebody down with you. Kill an innocent bystander. A stranger on his way home to see _his_ wife and kid. A _friend_, trying to keep you from doing something _stupid-_"

Nate turned to glare at him, his eyes seething with anger, and his voice sharp and acidic as he reminded him "We're not friends."

Maybe if Nate hadn't turned he would have seen the red light. As it was, all he saw was the demonic glow of headlights and the hurt in Eliot's eyes before his world exploded and everything turned black.

Nathan woke to the sound of sirens in the distance. Everything hurt. Even his eyelids felt bruised, probably from the lead weights he was sure were attached to them, as he struggled to pull them open.

When he finally did manage to open his eyes and look around, his first absurd thought was _Who turned the world upside down?_ before he realized that he was actually suspended in his overturned car by his seatbelt.

He struggled with the restraint until it released him, and he fell to the roof of his car, and crawled out through the window, taking stock of his injuries as he did so. Everything hurt, but it didn't _seem_ like anything was broken. There was a slow trickle of blood coming from his forehead, as well as a few minor cuts on his left arm, and what he was sure was going to be and angry bruise across his chest and abdomen from his seatbelt, but overall he supposed he was lucky. At least, if the heap of metal that was once his car was any indication.

Okay, so. Alive? Check. Functional? Check. Help on the way? Check. So what was he missing?

The answer forced all the breath from his lungs as a surge of panic gripped him.

Eliot.

He glanced back into the remains of the car, but didn't see the younger man. Carefully, he took a few shaky steps away from the wreckage, his eyes scanning his surroundings.

There. He saw him.

As quickly as he could, Nate rushed to his side, dropping to his knees with a wince, and hesitantly reached out to gently touch the side of Eliot's face.

_Oh God._

He was covered in blood. Soaked in it. On his face, his arms, matted in his hair, seeping through his clothes, dark, sticky stains, expanding ominously. Nate felt like he should be doing something, _anything_ to help the younger man. But he was afraid to touch him with anymore than the light press of his fingers, for fear of hurting him further, and his mind was stuck on an endless loop of _ohGodohGodEliotnoohGodohGodplease…_

It took a moment for Nate to realize that somebody had a hold on him, and was pulling him away, as two other people began buzzing around Eliot, touching him and saying things he couldn't understand, and then _moving_ him, and as they were loading him in the back of the ambulance, Nate pleaded "Don't hurt him."

Somebody ushered him into the back of the van as well, and he went willingly, his eyes never leaving the sight of Eliot's prone and broken body. One of the medics began dabbing at his head with a bit of Gauze, but Nate waved him away like a pesky fly, his focus solely on Eliot.

He had no idea how long it took to get to the hospital, though it felt like days, but all too soon Eliot was being whisked away by urgent-sounding doctors, behind swinging white doors, and he quickly moved around to the window, peering through the glass as Eliot was transferred to a bed and hooked up to too many tubes and wires.

He had been here before.

Feeling this chilling, choking sensation, a panicked pressure in his chest, and a curling sickness in his belly. Wanting to stay in this terrible, horrifying moment, for the fear of what awaited him once it passed.

Nate had been here before.

With Sam.

And now here he stood once more, staring into a hospital room, and feeling utterly _useless_ as doctors tried to shock a member of his family back into life. Feeling like a complete _failure_ each time his body convulsed, arching off the table, heart monitor screaming shrilly, competing with Nate's own hoarse cries.

Over two years, and it was as if nothing had changed.

And then he heard it.

_Beep._

For a moment he was sure his own heart stopped. And then he heard it again.

_Beep._

The world seemed to slow to a crawl, for just a second, before everything was suddenly in fast-forward.

Eliot was alive. He was alive. Nate felt like he could breathe again.

_Beep… Beep… Beep…_

That had to be the greatest sound he'd ever heard.

Nate watched the small spikes on the heart monitor, and the slow rise and fall of Eliot's chest.

_Just keep breathing, Eliot_, he thought.

_Please._

_Just keep breathing._

'I'm sorry'.

They'd told him that when Sam died.

Like it mattered. Like he cared that they were sorry.

When doctors tell you that your only son is dead, "I'm sorry" becomes the most empty, vile phrase in the English language.

Today, phrases like "internal bleeding", "punctured lung", and "cranial fracture" were spoken in solemn tones.

Painful phrases that scared Nate more than he'd like. Phrases he wished he didn't have to hear.

But he'd take them so long as it meant he didn't have to hear "I'm sorry".

Phrases like they were using meant Eliot was hurt, very hurt, but could be fixed. They meant that Nate could still find a way to fix this.

"I'm sorry" meant it was too late.

Nate kept waiting for those words to come.

When an hour passed and they hadn't, he thought that maybe it would be okay for him to step away for a moment to call the rest of the team.

He didn't know where his cell phone had gone, whether he had taken it with him when he had gotten in the car, if it was maybe lost somewhere amidst the wreckage, so he forced himself away from the waiting room and out to a payphone. His hands shook a little as he dialed a familiar number, and waited anxiously as it rang.

"_Hello?"_

"Sophie," Nate breathed, partially relieved, even as the knot in his gut tightened.

"_Nate? What is it? It's late."_

"Sophie. We - I… There was an accident."

"_What do you mean, 'an accident'?"_

He took a deep, shaky breath, trying to reign in his emotions. "I wouldn't give him the keys. I wouldn't - He got in the car, and, and I didn't see - I wasn't paying attention… I was so _angry_, and he was just trying to help, and then he was bleeding, _God_ there was so much _blood_, and it's my fault. Sophie…"

"_Nate, where are you now?"_

He heard the note of panic in her voice, and took a few more breaths. "County hospital."

"_We'll be there soon."_

He placed the phone back in it's cradle, and leaned his head against the box as he fought the urge to just fall apart. They were coming. Everything would be okay.

It had to be.

Nate wasn't sure what he'd do if it wasn't.

He finally made his way back into the waiting room only to be met with a frazzled-looking doctor.

_No._

"I'm afraid there were some complications-"

_No no no…_

"Eliot had an adverse reaction to the morphine-"

_No no no no no…_

"He went into cardiac arrest-"

_No. Please, no. Please God, I can't, not again, please…_

"-managed to shock him back into normal rhythm-"

_Wait._ "He's - He's alive?"

The doctor nodded. "He is. But his heart was stopped for several minutes. We won't know until he wakes up if there was any permanent damage. We did manage to re-inflate his lung, and repair the damage done to his spleen-"

Nate only half heard what the doctor was saying. He was still stuck on "permanent damage". What did that mean? That when Eliot woke (_when_, Nate told himself, _when_ Eliot woke up, not _if_) then he might not what? He might not be Eliot anymore? That wasn't possible. He would be fine. Everything would be fine.

The doctor walked off, and Nate mumbled a distracted "Thanks", before collapsing into a nearby chair.

Eliot was alive, and the team was on their way, and everything would be fine.

Just fine.

…As much as he dreaded their reactions, Nate really wished his team were here.

They wouldn't look at him.

Not since he'd told them what happened, what the doctor had said. Not since Hardison looked like he was going to be sick, and Parker had practically collapsed into his arms, and Sophie had dissolved into tears.

Maybe it was for the best. The way they had looked at him when he'd told them about the accident, when they realized that _it was all his fault_, he wasn't sure he could stand it.

They hated him.

They had to.

He hated himself.

It was with a mix of both relief and dread that the doctor informed them that they could see Eliot for a few minutes.

Parker shot up and out of her seat, practically running through the ICU in order to see him, but faltered at the door, wringing her hands anxiously. They caught up to her, and with Hardison on one side, and Sophie on the other, a gentle hand on her shoulder, they all entered the small room. Nate froze in the doorway.

Eliot had a way of seeming almost… indestructible. Nate had seen him go up against nearly insurmountable odds, and come out with naught but a few bruises. It was strange to think that someone so powerful could be felled by a friendship.

It was horrible, and wrong, and so _unfair._

Parker was the first to speak, her soft words impossibly loud in the near-silent room.

"He looks so - so… _little._ I've never seen Eliot look so little."

Nate had to agree. The younger man was hardly any taller than Parker herself, but he was so _strong_, so _solid _that you'd never notice.

But now he was so still, lying beneath dozens of bandages and a pile of blankets, tubes and wires and machines hooked up to him, pale and bruised. Dark lashes lay upon his cheeks, and his hair spilled out across his pillow, a hospital bracelet encircling one wrist, and a cast covering the other, an intubation tube obscuring the lower half of his face… He looked so young, and impossible frail.

_God, what have I done?_

They stood there for a long time, not really saying much, barely daring to breathe, just listening to the _beep_ of the heart monitor and the _whoosh_ of the respirator, and waiting tensely for the sound to come again, to be reassured that he was still there. Eventually the doctor returned, telling them not unkindly to get some rest, and that they could return in a few hours.

Nate wondered if the doctor was actually an idiot, suggesting that there was any way that they could _rest_ while Eliot was here, barely hanging on.

Parker reached out timidly as if to touch the Retrieval Specialist, but quickly retracted her hand, rubbing her arms as if she were cold, before practically fleeing the room. Sophie watched her leave, then leaned down and brushed a kiss gently across Eliot's forehead, while Hardison mumbled a quiet "Stay strong, man", before they too left, skirting around Nate, who still stood in the doorway, still not meeting his eyes.

He hesitated a minute longer, then determinedly took a step into the room, then another, and another, until he was standing directly beside the bed.

His legs practically gave out, and he was glad for the small stool that stood nearby as he carefully lowered himself onto it, unable to draw his eyes away from the sight of the younger man.

"I'm sorry," he finally told him, his voice quiet and rough. "I'm so sorry."

This time, no amount of deep breathing could stop him from falling apart.

He sobbed into his hands until the early hours of morning, when sleep finally claimed him.

White.

Everything was white. Bright, sterile white, that burned his eyes, and made his head throb. He closed his eyes against the assault, before quickly opening them again.

There was something important he should be doing. What was it?

The room smelled of ammonia and rubbing alcohol. Where was he? He'd been here before. A place like this. Many places, very much like this. Where was he?

An unfamiliar voice drifted into his room. _"Doctor Rosenberg to room 209, Doctor Rosenberg, room 209."_

A hospital. He was in a hospital.

_Why?_

Images assaulted his mind, images of Nate, and an empty bottle of Cognac, his car, an argument, and searing, _blinding_ pain, that stole his breath and his senses, and finally, a comforting, encompassing darkness.

_Nate._

Where was Nate?

His bright blue eyes moved around the room, searching for him, but found only Sophie, curled up in a chair asleep, as disheveled as he'd ever seen her, her clothes wrinkled, and hair slightly mussed.

He tried to ask her about Nate, but ended up choking, which apparently angered on of the monitors he was attached to, and awoke Sophie. She glanced at him sleepily, then broke into a wide, happy smile.

"You're awake! Oh, thank God, Eliot, we've been so _worried-_"

A doctor rushed in and hushed the monitor, then immediately got on his bad side by removing the tube that was down his throat, sending white-hot pain down it, even as he felt like he was coughing up a (very abused) lung, and then smiling at him like an idiot.

Eliot really, _really_ wanted to hit him, but settled for glaring instead.

"Soph," he tried, once the coughing had mostly subsided, and nearly gasped from the pain of feeling as though he had gargled glass shards and sandpaper. The doctor looked up from his charts, and tried to tell him that it was 'best if he didn't strain his voice', but was quickly silenced with another glare, and looked relieved when he was called away by the insistent beeping of his pager.

Sophie sat by his side, her hand gently covering the one of his which wasn't encumbered by a light blue cast (he wondered, briefly, who had decided he needed a _colored_ cast) and had her eyes fixated on his face, staring at him in a way that made him shift uneasily, and then hold back a wince of pain.

"Soph," he began again, grimacing, "is Nate - is Nate… Okay?"

Sophie took a great shuddering breath, as her eyes grew wide and then filled with tears, running over and spilling onto her cheeks, as she pressed her face against the mattress beside him.

_Aw, jeez._

He really, really hated it when girls cried. He couldn't stand to see it, and it always made him feel completely inadequate when they did, and he could do little but hold them and offer soothing words.

It was worse, he decided, when it was one of his team, and he was laid up in bed, his voice too raw for more than a small string of syllables at a time. So he settled for moving his good hand to gently run through her hair, drawing it gently away from her tear-stained face as she took a few deep, steadying breaths, obviously trying to stem the flow of tears, and failing miserably.

"Eliot," she finally managed to stay, though she was still crying profusely, "Oh Eliot. I don't know what we'd have done if- if-" She closed her eyes, a look of pain overcoming her features, before she shook it off, and looked at him like she had before, only more intensely, if that was even possible. "I'm so glad you're here. So glad you're still here."

The she was overcome by tears again, and when she noticed the slightly alarmed look on his face she told him through her sobs "Happy tears, Eliot. They're happy tears."

He still wasn't comfortable with seeing her cry.

But he was comforted by the small smile that teased the corner of her mouth.

A whole slew of people had been parading in and out of his room all day. From Sophie and that first doctor, it had been Hardison (who grinned so wide Eliot was sure for a moment that it would actually split his face in two, and brought him a mini DVD player and a box set of "Firefly") and Parker (who brought an old, slightly singed stuffed rabbit and told him he could "borrow" it, but only until he was better) to another doctor, several nurses, the first doctor again, some more nurses, Parker again (claiming she was checking up on Bunny, but looking at him critically) and another doctor. The sky was beginning to grow dark when he looked up and found Nate standing by the door.

He had two butterfly bandages adhered to his forehead, some bruising around his left cheekbone, and a few band-aids on one of his arms. Stubble covered his jaw, his eyes were rimmed in red, and his pallor seemed almost sickly beneath the harsh fluorescent lights.

Eliot had seen him angry, sad, unconscious, grim, and fall-down-flat drunk, but he'd never seen him look so… lost.

Nate stepped cautiously into the room, looking almost as if he were afraid to be there, then opened and closed his mouth a few times, shifting in place, and sticking his hands into his pockets, his eyes searching around the room, looking everywhere but at Eliot.

Minutes ticked by, until Eliot finally said "Nate."

Not a demand, or an accusation, or even a question. Just his name, simply said, in a quiet, coarse voice.

Finally Nate gathered the courage to raise his eyes to meet Eliot's. He was surprised at what he found there. They weren't filled with hatred, or anger, or blame. They were just… searching. For what, Nate didn't know, but he told him "I went to my apartment, and the office. I poured all the liquor down the drain. I won't- I- I'll do better. I'll fix this. I promise."

Eliot stared at him for a moment longer, and finally seemed to find what he was looking for.

"Okay," he told him. "I trust you."

And just like that, Nate knew that if he did nothing else, he _had _to keep that promise. Because Eliot's trust was worth so much more than the hollow solace found at the bottom of a bottle.

So much more.

He refused to let him down.

Not again.

Nathan had already lost one family.

He'd be damned if he destroyed this one.


End file.
